He’s not elected yet, Scholz is still Chancellor and Baerbock still minister of foreign affairs. The position of the foreign office regarding this definitely won’t change no matter what Merz tries to virtue signal: They prefer Netanyahu a) out of office, someone please resurrect Rabin, that failing b) as far away from Germany as possible so that this whole ICC thing does not have to even be considered.

Merz is an idiot constantly, impulsively, running his mouth, either he’ll get reigned in by the civil servants (and the most likely SPD foreign minister) or he’s going to fall on that sword. More likely he’ll find some other sword to fall on, find something else to piss everyone off that doesn’t have that kind of protective cordon around it so people won’t warn him off.

Can you imagine? Merz trying to repeal both ICC membership and the VStGB? Or having to argue before the constitutional court that the federal government should be able to grant immunity to known fugitives? This isn’t something you can do silently, it’s not even something where he can rely on party discipline. Whatever he means to gain from it, the costs are too high. Then, OTOH, he’s a shit strategist.